Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s plan to stop impounding vehicles with marijuana inside and dramatically reduce fines for those caught using it in public is poised to clear a City Council committee on Monday amid concern that it doesn’t go nearly far enough.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Illinois is concerned that the “disproportionate impact” cannabis enforcement laws have historically had on communities of color will continue, only with reduced fines.
“People who are experiencing poverty. People who are experiencing homelessness. People who are renting or in public housing. Those will be people who will still be prohibited and kept outside of this process,” ACLU spokesman Ed Yohnka.
“As a result, the enforcement that remains will be disproportionately directed towards those individuals and not more broadly. So one’s income level, or where one lives, could end up being impactful in terms of who gets targeted for continued enforcement and who does not.”
Even after Jan. 1, when adult use of pot is legalized statewide, people will continue to be fined for consuming marijuana in places where public use is not allowed or transporting unsealed cannabis in a vehicle or school bus.
But the ordinance xpected to be advanced Monday by the City Council’s Committee on Public Safety would establish a far more lenient approach to enforcement.
Currently, first-time offenders face fines ranging from $250 to $500 for “first-time minor offenses” involving up to 30 grams of weed and $500 for subsequent offenses that occur within 30 days of the first citation. Chicago also has a so-called “zero tolerance” rule requiring police to impound vehicles found with any amount of cannabis inside.
Under the mayor’s proposal, first-time offenders would face a $50 fine; subsequent offenses within 30 days trigger a $100 fine. And marijuana offenders would no longer face vehicle impoundment.
The ordinance also dramatically alters the Chicago Police Department’s “enforcement protocols” while still permitting officers to initiate investigations for “smoking or using cannabis in public places, in a vehicle and in places prohibited under the Smoke Free Illinois Act,” according to the mayor’s office.
Officers will be trained on “new protocols to lawfully conduct investigations and enforcement actions” for violations of the new law, as well as possession infractions, “including possession of unsealed cannabis in a vehicle, school, childcare facility or school bus.”
Yohnka said the decision to stop impounding vehicles with marijuana inside is a “huge” reform. Lightfoot “really got that right,” he said.
“People ended up losing their cars over using marijuana. They ended up not being able to go to work, not being able to take their kids to school or go to a doctor’s appointment or look for work,” Yohnka said.
“That is a really big step forward and they deserve a lot of credit for putting that into the ordinance.”
Yohnka acknowledged the Chicago Housing Authority had little choice but to prohibit CHA residents from using recreational marijuana in their own homes.
“That’s a federal issue that we’ll have to overcome,” he said.
Under pressure from public health advocates, the Illinois General Assembly agreed last week to limit public consumption of recreational marijuana to dispensaries and special smoke shops. Bars, restaurants, beauty shops and health clubs would be off-limits, under the change.
Chicago has less than six weeks to establish its specific ground rules for public consumption.
Yohnka said he can only hope it’s done in a way that mitigates the impact on CHA residents, renters, the homeless and mass transit riders who don’t own their own vehicles and, therefore, will have a tough time finding places to legally smoke or ingest marijuana products.
“It’ll be a matter of ensuring that there are other places where people can use, what is now a lawful product in ... some sort of dispensary or café, but to make sure that those are widespread enough among different communities so that everyone has access to them,” he said.
